This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by VebGen Official
I'm Ramesh. I'm 20, from India ๐ฎ๐ณ, and I've been coding since I was 17.
Eight months ago, I got frustrated watching my $247/month AI tool bill climb just because the AI kept re-reading my code to understand it.
So I built something different.
๐ธ The Problem with Every AI Coding Tool
Cursor. Copilot. Claude. They all do this:
Every time you ask a question, they send your entire codebase to expensive language models. Not to write code. Just to read it.
Then they forget everything and do it again for the next question.
You're basically paying rent for the AI to understand your own code. Over and over.
That's not coding assistance. That's a subscription trap.
โก VebGen: Read Once, Remember Forever
Instead of burning tokens on reading code, VebGen uses Abstract Syntax Trees (AST) to understand your code structure locally.
In 0.2 seconds. For $0. Forever.
Think of it like this:
- Other tools: Read the entire Harry Potter series every time you ask about a character ๐
- VebGen: Read it once, build an index, answer questions instantly โก
The AI only gets used for writing code, not reading it.
๐ Where Others Fail, VebGen Shines
๐ฐ 1. Token Costs
- Them: $20-500/month burning tokens on reading
- VebGen: $0 for reading, pay only for writing
๐ง 2. Understanding Your Code
- Them: Send entire files, hope for the best
- VebGen: Parse 95+ framework constructs, understand relationships, detect issues
๐ง 3. Self-Healing
- Them: Generate code, you fix bugs
- VebGen: Two AI agents work together (TARS plans, CASE builds), auto-fix 70% of bugs
โฟ 4. Accessibility
- Them: Generate code, you manually check WCAG compliance
- VebGen: Built-in WCAG 2.1 validation, color contrast checks, alt-text verification
๐ 5. Security
- Them: Hope nothing dangerous happens
- VebGen: Military-grade sandbox, can't harm your system even if it tries
๐พ 6. Losing Work
- Them: Crash = start over
- VebGen: SHA-256 verified state, 5 auto-backups, never lose progress
๐ ๏ธ My Journey
Month 1-2: Thought this would take 2 months. LOL. ๐
Month 3-4: Realized parsing Django models is harder than I thought. So many edge cases.
Month 5: Everything broke. Rewrote the entire agent system. Learned about dual-agent architectures.
Month 6: Added accessibility validation because I was tired of manually checking color contrast.
Month 7: Wrote 356 tests because debugging at 3 AM is awful. โ
Month 8: Finally released v0.3.0. Zero dollars spent on infrastructure. Just me, Python, and free-tier APIs.
The hardest part wasn't the code. It was believing that free-tier APIs could build something production-ready when everyone says you need expensive models.
Turns out, you don't. โจ
๐ The Numbers
After 8 months of solo work:
- โ 900KB production code
- โ 356 tests (99.7% pass rate)
- โ $0 spent (Gemini Flash is free!)
- โ WCAG 2.1 compliant output
- โ Open source (MIT license)
๐ก Why This Matters
You shouldn't pay a subscription just for an AI to read your code.
You shouldn't manually check accessibility compliance in 2025.
You shouldn't lose hours of work because the AI crashed.
VebGen proves you can build better tools with:
- Zero funding ๐ฐ
- Free APIs ๐
- One person ๐ค
- Open source ๐
If I can do this from India with no money, imagine what you can build.
๐ฏ Try It
โญ GitHub: https://github.com/vebgenofficial/vebgen
Installation takes 2 minutes. Works with OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, OpenRouter.
๐ What I Learned
Technical lessons:
- AST parsing is 10x faster than dumping files
- Free-tier APIs are shockingly powerful
- Dual agents > single agent
- Accessibility should be built-in, not bolted on
Personal lessons:
- Solo doesn't mean alone (open source community helped!) ๐ค
- Perfect is the enemy of shipped ๐ข
- 356 tests > 0 tests (obviously, but I learned the hard way)
- You don't need VC money to build great software ๐ช
โ Questions?
Ask me anything! I'm here to help and learn from this community.
If this resonates with you, star the repo โญ. It helps others discover VebGen and keeps me motivated.
Built with โค๏ธ in India ๐ฎ๐ณ
This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by VebGen Official
VebGen Official | Sciencx (2025-10-28T14:46:33+00:00) I Built a Million Dollar AI Coding Platform for Completely Free ๐ฎ๐ณ. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2025/10/28/i-built-a-million-dollar-ai-coding-platform-for-completely-free-%f0%9f%87%ae%f0%9f%87%b3/
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